The Giannoulias Democratic Illinois Senate campaign confirmed Monday–after prodding from the National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee–that Alexi Giannoulias was in Canada on Sunday attending a fund-raiser at a trial lawyer convention in Vancouver that would benefit his Senate campaign.

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Lee Fisher was in Canada yesterday to attend a reception with a group of American trial lawyers that is supporting his campaign, the Fisher campaign said today.

The Giannoulias campaign didn’t want to admit to the fundraising junket at all, while the Fisher campaign tried the novel technique of trying to frame it in terms of a fact-finding tour about lost Ohio jobs (apparently, Rob Portman has amazing powers over space and time; either that, or he mentally dominated Lee Fisher into losing jobs for Ohio). I don’t see why evasions and lying – excuse me; ‘jokes’ – are necessary, here. Trial lawyers are some of the most loyal Democratic donors in existence: they’ve paid out millions (if not billions) in campaign contributions, and get hundreds of billions in protection and opportunities* in exchange. Shouldn’t the Democrats be proud of their patrons?

Remember Obama’s effort to try a “test” for tort reform? (We don’t actually need a test, since it has worked to lower medical malpractice coverage and help increase access to doctors in states that have tried it.) Well, Pelosi’s bill has an anti-tort-reform measure. On pages 1431-1433 of the 1990 spellbinder, there is a financial incentive for states to try “alternative medical liability laws.” But look — you don’t get the incentive if you have a law that would “limit attorneys’ fees or impose caps on damages.”

See Hot Air for more, including a link to the actual language and a reminder that the Democrats never had any intention of doing anything at all to disconcert trial lawyers. Which is the point that I’d like to hammer home, here: there is no reason to be surprised at this. We knew back in August that something like this was going to happen; and this is precisely the sort of political doubletalk that the people opposing the Democrats’ health care rationing bill have come to expect from the current ruling party.

So. To any random Democrats reading this: when Nancy Pelosi looks you in the eye and tells you that the new health care bill addresses tort reform, she is lying to you. Because she thinks that you are stupid.

That’s a decent amount of savings, there: it’s a shame that the Democratic party would rather that trial lawyers got the money. After all, trial lawyers can be counted on to give the Democrats some of it.

“This is the answer from a doctor and a politician. Here’s why tort reform is not in the bill. When you go to pass a really enormous bill like that, the more stuff you put in it, the more enemies you make, right? And the reason that tort reform is not in the bill is because the people who wrote it did not want to take on the trial lawyers in addition to everyone else they were taking on. And that is the plain and simple truth.”

Not that Dean’s being completely truthful: the various health care rationing bills share a distressing lack of taking anybody on. And he neglected to mention that the problem wasn’t so much ‘taking on’ the trial lawyers as it was ‘losing the money‘ from them. But this is still more truth than we’ve grown accustomed to from a Democratic politician: no doubt one reason that they packed Dean off to American Samoa right after the election.